The prior art includes numerous small stoves which are gimbal mounted to enable the vessel or container (pot or pan) holding food or liquid to remain upright during rolling or pitching of a boat or movement of a recreational vehicle. A principal consideration for such a stove is safety to minimize potential fire hazards and the possibility of persons near the stove burning themselves by contact with hot parts or from spillage of material from the container, pot or pan. Several such patents are disclosed in United States patents as exemplified by U.S. Pat. No. 2,520,412 to Jensen; U.S. Pat. No. 4,445,495 to Frost; U.S. Pat. No. 4,653,462 to DeFoe; and U.S. Pat. No. 4,776,318 to Serra.
The Jensen patent discloses a cooking apparatus for a ship that will maintain the cooking container horizontal while the ship pitches or rolls. The cooking apparatus of Jensen is supported from a vertical wall of a galley and is provided with rotary supports vertically and horizontally disposed and adapted for holding a cooking container (pot or pan) horizontally when the ship pitches or rolls. The Frost patent discloses a cooking stove that is supported from a bulkhead (vertical wall) and is suitable for marine use in that its cooking container is gimbaled to swing about perpendicular horizontal axes to maintain the cooking container upright and horizontal notwithstanding the tilting of the bulkhead. The DeFoe patent discloses a galley stove having a gimbal mounting to accommodate the roll and pitch of a ship or boat on which the stove is used. The Serra patent discloses a portable cooking device having retainer means for partially surrounding a pot or pan above a burner to prevent the pot or pan from sliding from the cooking device.
While there are numerous cooking stoves for use in a motion filled, non-stable, environment such as boats, ships and recreational vehicles, most are complex, and all suffer from numerous deficiencies and disadvantages. The present invention overcomes these deficiencies and disadvantages in that it fills the needs for a simple, inexpensive, stove that can be used for cooking and warming purposes and can be easily mounted to existing or modified structures within boats, ships, and recreational vehicles.